It sucks that the PS3's price is due to that Blu-Ray that nobody is sure if they really want.
It sucks that the PS3's bungled production numbers are due to that Blu-Ray that nobody is sure if they really want.
It sucks that the average family has almost no chance of getting a PS3 by the end of the year.
It sucks that Sony would rather act cocky about it, claiming that people will pay $600 for a PS3 sans games, simply because it's awesome.
It sucks that I will not be part of the launch day fun... because the price is way out of line and the availability is shot to hell.
Although I love my Nintendo systems, when I want lengthy, detailed, intense, emotional, cinematic adventures, I go to the PS2. The games that I am most passionate about have been PS2 exclusives (or nearly exclusive): Fatal Frame, Kingdom Hearts, GTA, MGS, Katamari. So I like their track record.
Interestingly, only one of the names in that list is a holdover from the previous generation: Metal Gear Solid. I can't call GTA a holdover since GTA3 was so drastically different than the original Grand Theft Auto series. I mean, walking into the PS2 back in 2000, I probably would have said that my favorite PlayStation series were Resident Evil, Crash Bandicoot, Deception, and PaRappa/UmJammy. Funny how things change.
That's a good thing. It makes you wonder what is coming next... what will be the surprise releases, the extreme makeovers, and the new-gen hits that will define the PS3. It better be something more than WWII shooters.
The dawn of the next generation is always exciting. I hate that I can't be there as one of my very favorite systems goes through its first baby steps. Even if I did not mind the ridiculous price, I have no interest in fighting and clawing for a pre-order. The two weekends and three hours I invested in the Wii are already more than enough. It's just all hot and it hurts and stuff.
I'm pretty much shooting for a price drop sometime before October '07, when GTA4 comes out. Fingers crossed.
Although with such a highly-anticipated title on the horizon, why would they drop the price? It's more likely that they'll announce a price drop just after the GTA4 rush. Unless Blu-ray parts suddenly get really cheap. The PS3 would have to totally tank by second quarter to warrant a price drop... and as long as they keep not making enough units to go around, it will always look like a big sellout, so it's an easy PR win in the short term.
I do not see how Sony is going to maintain the strength of the PS2 when the PS3 costs so much and is so under-produced. They're destroying their momentum. And not that I want to see this generation go the same way, with Sony having a virtual lock on the industry, but you gotta admit, Sony's massive userbase led to some pretty great things on the PS2.
You wouldn't have seen Katamari Damacy otherwise. Or an astonishing three Fatal Frame games. Or Guitar Hero. Why would a relatively small-time company like Red Octane take a risk on manufacturing a weirdass custom controller, and license expensive music tracks, if there wasn't enough PlayStation owners to support it? As a GameCube or Xbox exclusive, Guitar Hero would have flopped. It might still have been a critical favorite, along the lines of Eternal Darkness, but it would not have been the sudden retail force that the game became. How many Xbox owners actually bought Steel Battalion, with its $200 cool-ass mecha control panel? Not enough to keep the game viable, that's for damn sure.
Despite Sony doing/saying some of the stupidest things ever for the PS3 hype (and you thought Microsoft crashed the 360 launch), I do not want to see them fail. I just need them brought back to earth.
